In the entertainment industry, Hollywood in particular, many actors and actresses enter the industry hoping to rise to the top and become household names in any discussion where movies and television are involved. While some end up not achieving this feat, others do, and a handful of others end up achieving more. This latter group not only becomes a household name to movie and television viewers, but is also in the industry history book. One such person who has achieved this feat is South African born actress, Charlize Theron. She started her career in 1995 and over the years she has built an impressive filmography which has seen playing various characters in movies and TV series. Indeed, a look at any list of Charlize Theron movies will leave anyone acknowledging that she is a great talent who deserves all the accolades she has gotten.
At first, Charlize Theron was educated at Putfontein Primary School and after some time was enrolled at the National School of the Arts in Johannesburg where she was a boarder. Around this time, she aspired to be a dancer but won a modeling contract which took her to Europe. When the contract expired, she moved to the United States with her mother, where she began attending the Joffrey Ballet School. However, due to a knee injury, her dancing ambitions came to an end. Either way, Charlie found her way into the acting industry and in 1995 she landed her first acting role in Children of the Corn III: Urban Harvest as a non-speaking character.
Well, many years have passed since then and any Charlize Theron movies list today will obviously show you that the actress has had a lot of roles including as producer or executive producer on many movie projects. Like all other A-list actors and actresses, Charlize has seen various ratings on her movies which has seen many of her fans asking about what her best and worst movies are. The paragraphs below answer that and more.
List of Charlize Theron movies ranked best to worst
1. Mad Max: Fury Road
Widely recognized as one of the best films the actress has appeared in since she began her career is the 2015 post-apocalyptic action film – Mad Max: Fury Road which depicts a time when civilization collapsed and where the world was a desert wasteland. Charlize Theron played the character of Imperator Furiosa.
The movie which starred other actors like Tom Hardy, Nicholas Hoult, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley were a huge hit at the box office as they earned $378.9 million on a budget of $150 million. It is also considered one of Charlize Theron’s best films, as it won her a few awards like the 2016 Saturn Awards for Best Actress and the 2016 Critics’ Choice Awards for Best Actress in an Action Movie.
2. Monster
Starring Christina Ricci as Selby Wall, BruceDern as Thomas, Lee Tergesen as Vincent Corey and others, Charlize Theron played the titular character of Aileen Wuornos in this 2003 Patty Jenkins-directed crime drama that Charlize Theron starred in. also co-produced. With a budget of $8 million, Monster earned $60.4 million at the box office much to the delight of its team.
In addition, the role of Charlize Theron in this film earned her, her most awards for a single work. Awards won by the film include Academy Award for Best Actress, Critics’ Choice Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture, Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Drama, Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Main Role and many more. Seeing this, there’s no doubt why Monster shouldn’t be listed as one of Charlize Theron’s best movies.
3. Devil’s Advocate
About 2 years into her career, Charlize Theron starred in The Devil’s Advocate, an American supernatural horror film directed by Taylor Hackford that still stands out as one of her best films to date. She played the character of Mary Ann Lomax in the film which grossed $153 million at the box office on a budget of $57 million. Although she was unable to win any awards with this film, she starred alongside Keanu Reeves as Kevin Lomax, Al Pacino as John Milton/Satan, Jeffrey Jones as Eddie Barzoon and others in the film still stands out as one of the best and most memorable Charlize Theron movies we saw early in her career.
4. The rules of the cider house
Also in the 90s, a time when most actors and actresses would still find their feet in the entertainment industry, Charlize Theron was already setting herself apart as an actress to look forward to. She did this in several ways, one of which was recording one of her best portrayals of film characters in The Cider House Rules. The 1999 American drama film won her a Bambi Award in the Shooting Star: Female category in the year 2000.
Rated favorably on IMDb, Cider House Rules turned out to be one of those works that an actress like Charlize Theron will remember and appreciate the day she agreed to be cast.
5. Prometheus
In 2012, Charlize landed another acting role which, many years later, still stands out as one of the best whenever a list of Charlize Theron’s best movies is compiled. The actress played the character of Meredith Vickers in the sci-fi film alongside other actors like Noomi Rapace as Elizabeth Shaw, Michael Fassbender as David, Idris Elba as Janek and others as they follow clues on the origin of mankind, but soon realize that they/We are not alone. Like all of Theron’s other commendable films listed here, Prometheus was also a box office success, as it grossed $403.4 million on a budget of $120-130 million.
6. Reindeer Games
At the start of the new millennium, CharlizeTheron starred in what we sadly recognize today as one of her not-so-impressive works. The film despite having a decent cast was marred by subpar plots and contrived plots. The American action crime thriller had stars like Gary Sinise as Gabriel Mercer, Ben Affleck as Rudy Duncan, Donal Logue as Pug, Danny Trejo as Jumpy and many more on its drop list. With a budget of $42 million, Reindeer Games was only able to return $32.2 million at the box office.
7. The Last Face
Entering as the second of the worst Charlize Theron movies is the 2016 film The Last Face which was directed by Sean Penn. The film tells the story of Wren Petersen, played by Charlize Theron, a doctor and activist working in West Africa with Doctors of the World, an organization his late father founded many years ago. Over time, she comes to meet Miguel Leon (played by Javier Bardem) who also shares her passion for helping people from poor and war-torn places around the world. Later, the two begin a romance during which Miguel’s past relationship between them. The film later begins to belittle the demographics it was meant to champion.
8. Sleepwalking
At a time when it was obvious that CharlizeTheron had had an impressive acting career, she sought to grow her career by branching out into film production. The 2007 drama film titled Sleepwalking was the third film she would work on both as an actress and as a producer, which ultimately fell short of expectations.
In the film which had Charlize Theron as JoleenReedy, we saw that the talented actress was not given enough screen time, which is one of the many reasons that many critics cite as the reason for the poor performances of the movie. With overwhelmingly negative reviews, there’s no denying that this is one of Charlize Theron’s worst films.
9. Waking up in Reno
In the same year Charlize starred in one of her best works, an American robbery action thriller – The Italian Job, she also had a casting role as Canidy Kirkendall in Waking up in Reno, an American comedy-drama film that in no way stands out as one of Charlize Theron’s best films. She was cast in the 2002 film alongside actors and actresses like Natasha Richardson as Darlene Dodd, Penélope Cruz as Brenda, Billy Bob Thornton as Lonnie Earl Dodd, Holmes Osborne as Doc Tuley, and Patrick Swayze as Roy Kirkendall.
With a disappointing box office run, Waking Up In Reno secures a second to last spot on this (worst) section of Charlize Theron movies.
10. The Astronaut’s Wife
For every actor and actress, there always seems to be one or two works they have starred in, but it hasn’t lived up to expectations. For Charlize Theron, one of those works that has been flagged in multiple quarters to top the list of her worst performing films is Astronaut’s Wife.
The Rand Ravich has directed the American sci-fi thriller film despite having some of Hollywood’s top talent like Johnny Depp as Armacost Commander Spencer, Joe Morton as NASA Representative Sherman Reese, Clea DuVall as Nan and others, ended up not attracting many screen views unlike what is typical of some Charlize Theron movies we listed at the start of this article. The 109-minute feature made on a budget of $75 million was only able to bring in a disappointing $19.6 million.